Good news: we’ve been informed by our publisher that Baseball Prospectus 2010 will depart from their warehouse on Monday, February 8. Allowing a day or two for the trucks to roll and some more time for stores and online sellers to unbox the things and it’s possible that copies could start appearing in stores by the end of next week and in your mailboxes not long after that. We very much hope you enjoy annual #15.
In other news, our pals at Wiley are running a contest around the book: the five winning entrants will get a chance to talk fantasy strategy with the BP author of their choice (choose carefully: I am more likely to talk about Phil Rizzuto, the films of Preston Sturges, and how the 1985 Royals were like Bob Dylan’s “Blood on the Tracks” than I am to offer quality fantasy advice. Still, to each their own). See the link for details, no purchase necessary, yadda yadda and so forth.
Finally, some tour dates are starting to come together. Not all details have been finalized, but here are some of the appearances we have planned:
Sunday, February 28, 3 PM: Once again, we kick off our tour at The Yogi Berra Museum and Learning Center at Montclair State University, New Jersey. Kevin, Christina, Jay, and I expect to be there and other authors are possible. We’ll be filming this one, so come out, talk some baseball, and be preserved for posterity.
Monday, March 1, 6 PM, New York City: We are pleased to return to the Barnes & Noble at 18th Street and 5th Avenue in Manhattan. If you check their calendar of events, it says of the BP annual, “ow it its fifteenth edition,” to which I can only say, “Amen, brother.”
Tuesday, March 9, 7 PM, Washington, DC: We make our annual pilgrimage to the great Politics and Prose bookstore.
Monday, March 15, 7 PM, Boston: We once again ride the escalators to the top floor at the Boston University Bookstore. Please arrange warm temperatures, Boston.
Tuesday, March 16, Time TBA (tentatively noon), Boston: We alight at Northeastern University for a chat at the Snell Library, 360 Huntington Avenue.
Thursday, March 18, 6 PM, Chicago: Christina and Kevin return to the DePaul University Loop Campus Bookstore for windy Windy City hi-jinks.
Stay tuned for more information. We look forward to seeing you along the trail.
For Toronto, or anywhere else, you can either: Lobby the publisher to send one of us or do it yourself. Organize a Pizza Feed or Ballpark Event and one of us will come. Jamey Newberg puts on a world-class event every year in Dallas.
I did an event in Toronto a couple years ago organized by a reader. I'll go virtually anywhere if i'm not losing money on the deal.
Any shot for philly? You guys have a few writers in the city of the brotherly love right?
I know the Upenn bookstore was a miserable experience last year. But it was the Upenn bookstore, and I wouldn't expect much. There certainly has to be a better location.
Philly in general is a pain in the arse and I feel like I can say that because I have lived there. Anyhow, if you try either Plymouth Meeting, King of Prussia, or maybe Cherry Hill, NJ, I am sure the experience would be much better. Free parking, more space, and more accessible to larger numbers of subscribers.
If you would like to stick to the University theme check out the following.
Villanova, Bryn Mawr, Temple (extension campus not main), West Chester, Arcadia. Jersey folks across the stream please chime in..... Princeton would even be better than Philly.
If you can get outside of the city limits, myself and at least four others that I know are there. Two of which live in Philly currently and would not attend UPENN.
I would love to do a Princeton Pizza Feed again... Christina and I had a very nice turnout the one that we did. Is there a lot of love out there for that idea?
I live in Philly and I'd certainly turn out for Philly. Princeton would depend on what time of day and what day of the week. If its on a weekend I may be able to do it.
I'd turn out for a talk in Philly just about anytime.
In general, I'm in favor of special treatment for low number people, but I'm pretty sure no event is ever coming to my neck of woods even if I had negative numbers, unless there's more love for North Florida than I'm imagining.
I might have you at my table, Goldman. We could have a Capra-Sturges throw-down. I'm going Lady Eve as my tops, but it's hard to beat the church scene in Sullivan's (or go wrong with any of his features from that 3-4 year stretch).
FWIW, I'm planning on making a trip up to the Twin Cities this summer (Minneapolis/St. Paul, not the Twin Cities from close to where I grew up, Marysville and Yuba City, CA), and I would hope we'd be able to put on a BP Pizza Feed if there's enough interest in the area.
Good to hear. Might I suggest either Red's Savoy in St. Paul or Pizza Luce in Minneapolis as locations for the possible Pizza Feed? I'm sure some of my Twin Cities brethren have their own ideas about our best pizza offerings, but those are my favorites.
If you do Princeton or New Brunswick, I'll bring cupcakes that are better than last year's rice crispie treats. With some lipitor on the side, of course.
Since I am no longer in a big city (damn you, Boston! - oh, wait, I miss it. Apologies all around), I think that Mr. Goldstein, as our resident prospect fella, should be put on a bus, minor leagues style, and forced to do events at dozens and dozens of minor league towns. Here in Charleston SC we can certainly take care of the feed part, and I'd be willing to bet that our local minor league team would, with a little prodding, be willing to help put on an event. Of course, it would probably turn into some charity "dunk the stathead/bizarre food eating" tween inning contest, but hey - gotta promote the book, right? (note to self: work on that internal brain filter when writing posts on little sleep)
At a Johnson City, TN Cardinals game I attended way back (long enough ago that Dmitri Young played in the game) where the postgame entertainment was a guy named the Amazing Dan or something. Dan was an old guy who came out to the middle of the infield wearing a helmet and a jumpsuit and sat on a cube of some kind of explosive. The PA guy says, "And now, watch as the Amazing Dan blows himself up!" The cube explodes, Dan goes up about three feet in the air and lands on his back on the remains of the cube, arms and legs flung out in all directions. He lay motionless for a full minute or so, and the PA guy felt obligated to say, "Don't worry, folks, the Amazing Dan is only stunned!" After that he twitched a few times and a couple of people came on and got him to his feet and he staggered off the field to a kind of bewildered, staggered applause. It wasn't entertaining, but more like a vision of a man who was in hell.
I think we need to devote an entire message board for people to post when they find BP2010 in their local bookstore - so that other readers know when to make that trip to Borders.
54 comments have been left for this post.
Can't wait to stroll into Borders next week and walk out w/a copy!
I'll even pay for it! LOL